Crown Upon His Head
by agelade
Summary: Written for the genteensybang over on LJ, with amazing art from chomaisky. Ruby is on a mission, and her mission is going to get himself killed.


**Crown Upon His Head  
A **_**Supernatural **_**Story  
**

i.

She is new, as far as demons go. Some have been burning, twisting, smoke and blood and sulphur-sweat - some have been burning for millennia and she is so new she is velvet black and translucent like silk when she moves.

She's lost her name. The composition of darkness is better than a fingerprint and she doesn't have or remember wanting vocal cords to speak a name with, not like this, not in the labyrinth of brittle bone and beating hearts and blood and flesh that makes up the cages of the animals that howl, the animals she once numbered among, the animals she might one day see crawling at her feet if only-

The ancient among them do have names, on the breaths of the undying animals who are shaped by their skilled hands. Azazel their King, Ba'al, Sephaim, Adrezel, Belial, Alastair, and the others. She meets Azazel's daughter when she petitions the king to claim her as his own, to raise her up as he has the handful of others he calls son or daughter.

And he refuses her, of course he does. She is so new, only yesterday it seems as though she were the witch whose skin could not contain the lace of agony knitting up inside of it, the animal whose bones could not stand the strain of its muscles as it fought, whose mind could not justify continuing to fight when there was no hope no hope no release, only the growing dark of vengeance, the creeping desire to hurt to harm to revisit upon some other mewling creature-

He refuses her, of course he does.

Azazel's daughter does not comfort her out of kindness, no that would be unwise, and she doesn't want that anyway. Instead they forge a sort of low-level alliance, so that if she requires assistance, something small, Azazel's daughter would give it. Perhaps. And if - _when _Azazel's daughter calls upon her, she will come. It isn't pity, it isn't kindness. It's a deal that will be collected on. But she has nothing without it. Nothing but this deal with unspoken terms. She does not know what her part will be, but Azazel's daughter will collect, whatever it is.

They seal this deal by rushing through one another, fingerprints of swirling smoke and perhaps some blood some bone of her latest victim or perhaps Azazel's daughter's latest pet, intermingling the stuff of demon's souls, the velvet black, the heat of sin and desire and that limitless void - the foreign sensation of another's fingerprints racing through her, a violation and a thrill -

ii.

"Cute."

Ruby rolls her eyes, looks back down into her beer without looking back. "You said he likes blondes."

"He does." A big man takes the seat at the bar next to Ruby, gestures at the bartender, grins at Ruby.

Ruby frowns. Azazel's daughter, _she's calling herself Meg now, she's too close to the brothers, but of course, Ruby would have done anything to have been so close_ - Meg is amused, and that's dangerous.

"Tell me."

Meg breathes deep, looks off. When she takes these big male meatsuits, she is craving something. Ruby shifts.

"Why do you even care about the Winchesters?" Meg asks, and she's suddenly shrewd, and Ruby wonders if she isn't telegraphing her own suspicion a bit too much, or maybe she's doing it on purpose, so that Ruby will know she's playing her own hand too obviously.

Because they both love Lucifer, okay? But Meg loves him as her future king, the maker of her father, and as her father as well, and Ruby loves him as her savior, and she is devoted to the cause, but her mission is secret, and Dean isn't even in hell yet. It's too soon to tip her hand. And if Meg suspects - well, if Meg suspects, then she hasn't told anyone yet, because if she had, more than a few demons-who-would-be-King would have descended on Ruby already, and she'd be dead, Sam Winchester close behind her.

Ruby shrugs. "Come on. You've heard the rumors. I just want to be in his good graces if and when the time comes. Same as you."

Meg watches her a moment. "If and when the time comes," she echoes.

"Yeah." Ruby shrugs like _hopefully soon, right? A girl can hope! Gosh I have no information about it at all but I'm really hopeful it'll happen! _"Anyway, I don't think just being blonde is the trick here," Ruby says, looking down at her meatsuit. "Help me out."

"Well for one," Meg says with a lift of her brow, "I think you're missing the 'busty' part of blonde and busty." She drinks her drink and there's a grin at the corner of her mouth.

Ruby rolls her eyes. "That's not." Shakes her head. "He isn't."

"Spit it out, sweetie," Meg says, saccharine.

"That stuff won't work with him."

"He already trusts you," Meg points out. "What more do you need?"

Ruby frowns, wonders not for the first time just how much Meg knows about Ruby's mission. "He doesn't trust me so much as... not _not_ trust me. I guess. But I need him to..." _To need me. To care, to run into battle for me, to believe I'm something I'm not. _"Like I said, I just want to be standing there when - _if_ the rumors are true. I need something more than 'not hate.'"

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Meg's mouth curls slow, one large hand on Ruby's tiny thigh. "Oh Ruby..." Meg leans in close, slides that hand upward. "You want to know something special about Sam Winchester?"

Her breath is thick with some alien macho timbre. Ruby shivers. "Yes."

"I've been inside him, I've felt through every little part of him. You want to know what it was like?"

Ruby closes her eyes; the warm wet air wisps across her skin, a wash of heat over her collarbone and she tries to imagine wriggling into every molecule of Sam Winchester, her boyking, the Throne of Lucifer, the fair-minded godking of Hell.

"Well?"

"Yes, god yes."

"Too bad."

iii.

She wanders the surface of the earth, and down within it, and up in the stratosphere just because she can. There are beautiful things in this world of men, things that have far surpassed anything she can remember of her own time as a mortal witch. She is embarrassed to have to look up her own history, but if it's been centuries of this slow-moving earth time, it has been millennia down below and her memory is hazy, okay? But even so, they did not have the internet in 1354, they did not have cars or sanitary water, they didn't even have hand sanitizer. How did they ever survive? _(Well, they didn't, did they? Everyone died and you sold your soul and now-)_

There are beautiful things in this world, and Sam Winchester is one of them. Oh sure, handsome if you go for the fleshy human breakable sort. But more than that, he is so pure and yet bears Azazel's blood in him, bears it better than any of the others (but they knew that going in, knew he was going to be the one, match made in heaven, yeah she knew that too and she doubted even Meg was privy to _that_ information).

And yet as beautiful as he is in all of the ways he can be broken, the ways he can bleed, Sam Winchester is also just...

Just a really huge disappointment.

There's no regal bearing in this boyking. His shoulders rise up, his head ducks low. He's a full 6'4 and yet he is every inch a small man, looking up at everyone around him. Looking up at that brother of his.

And there's not much pride in him either. Occasionally the humans around him call him prideful because they are petty little animals and they consider it a flaw, but the truth is that he is a self-effacing little shit who can't see his own strengths, the ruthlessness she sometimes sees when he knows he's doing something he thinks is right. The power of his grief, the terrible raw unstoppable hurricane of it devoted to saving his brother from the hounds.

None of those things are strengths, to him. And he is as far from proud or regal as he can get. But she is going to save him.

iv.

"What's this about?"

"You said he liked blondes. He does. But there was something he wanted more."

Meg looks at her like Ruby's figured out a puzzle Meg had put together centuries ago. Meg's in a petite little body too, now. There's a soul in hers though, Ruby can see it stamped down in there. She doesn't think Meg has ever taken a soulless meatsuit; if she had, she'd probably never go back. It's cold, sure, but there's something sharp and clear about being the only thing in these cells, owning every action.

Ruby tosses her dark hair. "He wants a clear conscience."

"Now she's starting to get it," Meg says with an appreciative little laugh.

"Yeah, thanks for the heads-up," Ruby says, rolling her eyes. They're in another nameless bar, somewhere a hunter would never show up, somewhere a demon would never think to look for them. They are technically allies, but Ruby has the upper hand since Azazel was killed, since his plan had failed and the other demons went into scramble mode. But of course Azazel had rejected Ruby, and her deal with Meg was a private matter, and she has found new purpose since then, under the new Queen. And poor desperate Meg is on the outs.

"No sweat, sweetheart. Listen, no one knows I'm here, do they?"

"Not as far as I know. Why?"

Meg glances around, even though the whole point of this place is to stay off the radar. "Just wondering."

"You don't have to worry. I mean. I'm not going to sell you out."

"Even if it would keep other demons off your tail?"

Ruby frowns. "Yeah. Why?"

Meg looks at her like she's disappointed. "Poor sweetie. Not very good at this, are you?"

Ruby is confused for half a moment before Meg's grin turns sinister and her arms are grabbed from behind. The humans in the bar run for the doors but are mostly just fodder; anyone left alive is taken as a host, and Meg makes a quick get away after breathing into Ruby's ear:

"Sorry darling. It's survival, you know that. Good luck."

Meg is gone. It's Ruby versus six or seven demons, older than she is, she thinks. They've chosen some impressive meatsuits, not that that actually matters. Unless they have some fighting training, and then their reflexes will be better and their bodies will move with less effort. Her own body is this braindead girl she found, functionally dead, soul long since gone. No training, muscles effectively unworked for the year she lay in that hospital bed; she only looks healthy because Ruby's power has restored her, but she's a pathetic weak little human, mechanically speaking. She takes down only one of the demons who advance on her and soon she's bound to the bartop with knives through her palms and one guy sitting on her knees.

They're going to try to find Sam through her, so they can kill him, so they can put their own man on the throne, someone who isn't Lucifer. Heathens. But just her luck, she doesn't know where Sam is just now, because sometimes he just runs off, hides himself and sometimes she thinks he cares about her well-being and sometimes she thinks he cares only because she's helping him rescue Dean, and sometimes she knows she has no idea what Sam is thinking at any given point, because he's complicated and he doesn't talk and he's both darker and way more idealistic than she imagined he'd be.

She could die here.

"What's your interest in the Winchester?" one of them asks. It's the sixth time he's asked. His breath smells terrible, and she knows _terrible._

"Nothing," she answers, again.

"You think he's the one from the prophecy, don't you. Who are you working for?"

"That prophecy is just religious dogma. There is no boyking. As if a mere mortal could be the throne of Lucifer-"

"It'll never work. Dean Winchester isn't even close to breaking-"

"Dean will never break," Ruby says. She has to hope that's not true, that the laughing, drunken man she knew before he went to hell will break sooner rather than later. Because she isn't sure how long she can keep her hold on Sam before he gets himself killed with his own self-loathing. But she stares the demon in the face, smiles, and says though it kills her, "Dean Winchester will never break."

"Then why are you with the kid? Tell us where he is."

"No."

A bottle breaking, a sear of agony up her side where the glass is raked.

"Come on. Kill him and join us. You could be Queen beside our King."

"Lilith is Queen. You'd do well to remember that," she spits, and the guy beats her in the face with his fist.

"So you're just pals with a Winchester, is that it?" he says, laughing.

"I guess I am-"

"Leave her alone!"

He comes in like a King, she thinks, ignoring the plaid and the dark circles under his eyes and the way he stinks of alcohol. He is tall and he comes bearing blades stained with blood and he is going to tear these guys apart.

_Come on. Just like I taught you._

But he isn't good enough at that yet to just take them down to their smoke and molecules. He tears them apart the old-fashioned way, and that's okay too. Ruby watches, feigning fear, exuding "damsel" to encourage him, and Sam Winchester takes down the five demons that are left before coming to her, pulling the knives from her hands and helping her to her feet.

"You okay?"

"I am now," she says. Then frowns at the blood on his face. "You?"

"I'll live." He turns from her, stomps out of the bar, wavering only a bit, braces himself on the doorframe before continuing on. His grief keeps him upright, but it won't last much longer.

"Come on," she says, takes him by the arm. "Let's hole up somewhere."

They end up in a motel. His shoulder is dislocated, a rib or two broken. He's got a nice looking gash over his eye that needs stitches. There's a catalog of crap wrong with him once she gets him stripped to his jeans and lying on the bed, and not all of it is from just this last fight.

Her King lays on a filthy, stained mattress, in a motel that stinks of drink and humanity, in the middle of nowhere. No crown on his head but dark unwashed curls. No rings on his fingers but the blood of smashed knuckles and other people's broken noses. No robe over his shoulders in purple and gold and crimson, no satin slippers for his feet, no. Just a threadbare sheet she throws over him when he shivers from pain or grief or cold, just boots a decade old and much repaired, caked in guts and gore though two months ago he'd have scrubbed them clean after every hunt.

Her broken King lays on a pyre with a torch in his hand.

She's got to get him back.

"How did you find me?"

"A little birdie told me you were causing trouble." He winces and drags his hand up to his injured shoulder.

"A little birdie, huh?" No one was supposed to know where she was, that was the whole point of that bar in particular. "No idea who? Doesn't sound like you, Sam."

He laughs, a little, more like a cough, and he settles, breathes slow. "No idea," he says. He's passing out. That's okay. He's mostly human after all.

"Sam, you're beat up pretty bad. Let me help you-"

"I don't want it."

Ruby slides closer to him on the bed, her hip against his side, and she leans over. She fingers a limp lock of hair with her fingertips, draws it from his face, smooths it down his temple, his jaw. Her touch is light, her eyes heavy-lidded. "Oh Sam. Let me help you."

"I don't want it," he repeats, but he's staring at her, eyes dark and seeking. Not quite alert, but not close to sleep either; he's in a daze. "I don't-"

She brushes her fingers across his mouth. "Shh. Shh. I know how you feel."

"How-"

"I never wanted to be a demon," she says softly. "But I am one, and all I can do now is try to make the best out of it."

"Save Dean," he breathes, and she nods. "Save... save people..."

"That's right. This is the only way to kill Lilith and get Dean out of his contract."

He nods. They've gone over this, but Sam is lucid only about 65% of the time, and he drinks and he fights and he wins, but at a price. She's sure that without the blood she's been convincing him to take from her, he'd have been brain dead from concussion after concussion by now, or in a shallow grave, or a John Doe in a morgue. He is no King. Not yet. Not when he can only sometimes remember his own name.

Dean's name, he never forgets. She clings to that.

"Come on, baby," she says. "You're gonna be okay. We're gonna save your brother but you have to be alive to do the heavy lifting, okay?"

He nods drowsily.

"I'm gonna fix your shoulder-"

"I got it-"

"Yeah, right." He can barely lift his head. The adrenaline is gone, the alcohol is sinking back in. He nods at her and she braces her hand against his chest near the collarbone. He's squeezing his eyes shut in anticipation. There's no counting, they don't work that way. There's no sparing him. She doesn't need a weak King. She pulls his joint back into place a moment later, and his whole body jerks with the sudden agony.

"Shh shh," she says. "Ready?"

He nods. She cuts. She bleeds. He drinks.

He sleeps for a couple of healing hours and when he wakes, he is a terror and he is angry and she smiles when his back is turned, because she thinks she can see the glow of a crown upon his head, the swirl of a cloak of jewels and blood around his feet. When he is like this, he can accomplish anything, and he is the noblest Throne a King could ask for, and he is her savior, the one she has dreamed of.

And _she made that._

"Come on," he says.

She cants her hips, blinks her eyes. Her meatsuit is pretty and dead, the way he likes it, the only way he'll accept her, and she wants to claim him, she wants to be sure that she's got him. The broad shoulders and powerful way he can lift her with one arm and swing her around doesn't hurt. He feels like he's in control that way.

But he just curls a lip at her in disgust and bangs out of the door.

More training. More training and all he wants is to get to the point where he can kill Lilith and free his brother. It's all very... noble. Ruby sighs. This is what she gets for leaning so hard on _Dean_ to get him to comply.

v.

_This isn't going to work_, he has said, a hundred times now, as he finds himself on the floor. _This isn't going to work. I'm not strong enough. What you're asking me to do, I can't do it._

_He's burning, Sam,_ Ruby has tried, a hundred times now, as she picks him back up.

But it's just _Dean would hate what I've become_ this and _I can't stand up, I can't even see straight_ that, and she's getting him off the floor, she's wiping blood from his lips and she's making him count her fingers and she's putting him to bed because he can't make a coherent sentence, and she knows it's only partly because he's doing what no human should even be attempting, Azazel's Gift notwithstanding. She knows it's because every moment he isn't attempting to exorcise a demon from some poor sucker's body, he's tormenting himself with what is happening to Dean, he's trying to live through some of Hell for his poor deluded brother, he's trying his damnedest to make it not true-

And he's drinking a lot, and she thinks she's caught him dulling the pain with some pills or another. God knows he grew up with a pharmacy in the glove compartment.

And then she says again _He's burning, Sam, you have to-_

And there's this look in his eye, this dead look that thrills and scares her - if she knew how dangerous he was before, now she feels it to her core - and he says: _I know. Let's go again_. And he gets _himself_ up off the floor and he wipes the blood from his nose and he goes again, and he gets himself up off the floor and he says _again_ and again and again-

And he isn't going to survive this.

Dean isn't going to break fast enough for Sam to survive this.

vi.

There are those that recognize her in Hell. She avoids them. She never asked Alastair to be her demonic Big Brother, even though she was tempted. She's older now, but being rejected by _two_ of Meg's mentors would sting too much.

But that suits her purposes now; she doesn't want him to recognize her or sense her presence when she enacts her plan.

She is silky black smoke and the man on the rack with hooks in his metaphysical flesh is moaning and shaking and sometimes within the muttering she can make out the word _Sam_.

She waits for Alastair to move on to another poor sad screaming wretch, and then she wraps herself around Dean's shimmering soul and sinks in, so they can have a chat.

It takes her nearly a month of coming to him every moment Alastair is away, as soon as Alastair has offered Dean the knife, as soon as he vanishes to give Dean time to think, she is there, and their conversation is always more of the same:

_He's suffering, Dean._

_At least he's alive._

_Not for much longer. He's going to get himself killed._

_He's stronger than that._

_You could help him._

_From here? Yeah right._

_I can tell you how._

_Fuck off._

More and more of that, until one day, she says:

_Let me show you something_.

And Dean sees Sam, fighting four or five demons, Sam coughing on blood, Sam stitching himself up, Sam nightmaring _Dean Dean!, _Sam rushing into hunts too drunk to see straight, Sam Sam Sam, heading full speed toward death.

_Sam, Sammy what are you doing? Goddammit Sam no no, _Dean says then.

She can feel the shudder of disappointment in him, and that makes her so angry, that this broken mortal can presume to judge her grieving King, but then he's saying _But what can I do?_ and he's so upset and worried and he's asking-

_Time moves so much faster down here. Just give in to what is being asked of you. Just give in, Dean_.

_Give in? You're telling me to... what? Become a demon?_

_That's right. Then you'll be free. You can go topside. You can be with Sam._

_You're insane. I'd be a _demon. _I'd be evil._

_You know as well as I do, you could never harm Sam. And you know some demons who have tried to help. Picture it, Dean._

He does. She can see it. He's topside again, he's imagined himself into his own body, but who wouldn't. He finds Sam, he protects Sam, he leans on Sam for the morals he now lacks, he flashes those black eyes at anyone who even comes close to Sam with violence in their veins.

He pictures it and his metaphysical mouth moves around the word _Sam Sam Sam, _but he says:

_No_.

But he is breaking. He is breaking. She shows him Sam everytime he is alone for another week of Hell time; up top, Sam is in slow-motion, but she has plenty of footage because Sam doesn't do anything halfway and that includes grief-by-self-destruction. Sam is bloody, Sam isn't sleeping, Sam has lost weight, Sam is blinking blearily at the creatures before him, Sam Sam Sam.

_Dean. You know what you have to do._

She shows him his baby brother, face down on a motel room bed, bleeding into the sheets, half a bottle on the nightstand, door to the elements wide open, practically begging some fugly to find him and end him.

_No,_ he says, _no no no-_

And soon enough, it's clear what he's saying no to, because the next time she comes to him, he's holding the knife. He's off the rack and he's holding the knife and the blood on his hands isn't his.

A month of real-time later, he's yanked out of hell, and that's only because it took those angel bastards that long to find and free him.

vii.

"You knew this was gonna happen, didn't you?"

Meg is cute, little dark-haired body she had before, she seems to like this one. Maybe because she seems to like Ruby's little dark-haired one too. She's the jealous sort, Ruby thinks, she's the sort to lie and manipulate and then tell you she loves you.

And Ruby is the sort to lie and manipulate and tell you she loves you too, but her problem is that she means it, and her problem is that she is starting to fall for her charge, her King, her savior.

But she doesn't know him. She doesn't know him at all, because he does these things like give himself up, like give her up at the drop of a (big brother's) hat.

But we knew Dean would be back, would change everything. It was always going to be harder with him around.

"Knew what was gonna happen?" she says.

Meg just smiles. If she knows anything, she doesn't say. And if she knows anything, she hasn't told anyone else. Maybe she loves Lucifer like Ruby loves Lucifer. Maybe she always has. Maybe Ruby could tell her about the mission, maybe Ruby could have an ally. But then Meg says:

"Why do you care so much about Sam Winchester?"

And Ruby shrugs. She can't give it up. Meg's a demon. "He's interesting. I mean, you know about the whole Special Children thing, I assume." She knows Meg knows about it, but she can't tip her hand. "He's the only one left, and I guess... I mean." She pretends to be embarrassed. "You know how much I wanted to be one of you, one of Azazel's daughters." Okay. She doesn't have to _pretend_. Her cheeks flame with it.

Meg appraises her sidelong. "Right," she says, eyeing her up and down. "I remember."

It was only 78,000 years ago, Ruby thinks. It was only the thing that consumed her life until she learned of Lucifer's light and grace and perfect bloody reign.

Meg leans in, eyes half closed. "Hey. No hard feelings about that bar that time, huh?"

Ruby breathes in Meg's scent, human and clean overtop that sulfur tang. "No, no hard feelings."

"Because I was just watching out for myself."

"I know."

"Anyway, you had a hero come rescue you, didn't you?"

"Y-yeah."

Meg smiles predatory. "And what a hero he is. Is _that_ why you care?"

"Maybe." _Maybe. Maybe._

"So you got him wrapped around your finger."

Ruby frowns, plays with the label of her beer. "I guess so."

"Come on. He's drinking your blood-"

"How did you-"

"I got ways. Don't worry, your little secret is safe with me. Although I'm not sure what you think you're gaining by training him to kill us."

"Maybe I'm just training him to kill my enemies," Ruby says.

"Oh," Meg says, bats her eyelashes. "Is this your subtle way of saying I better stay on your good side?"

Ruby smiles sly. "Maybe."

Meg laughs.

"Seriously though. I need... more. I need to _know_ more. He likes blondes, he likes breasts, he likes cowgirl-"

"He likes cowgirl?"

"Shut up, and you knew that already. But these things, they... it's not... enough, somehow."

Meg smiles against Ruby's ear, breath hot. "You want to know how that big lug works?" she asks. She always asks. Ruby always says yes. Meg always says too bad.

Ruby says, "Yes."

Meg licks her lips. "Come back to my room with me."

viii.

"_He likes to be pushed, just a bit. He likes to be challenged," says Meg as she backs Ruby up to the bed. She shoves at Ruby's shoulder; Ruby, off balance, falls back._

Sam falls back with a drunk little laugh, a dark little laugh. "No, no way."

"_But you can't push him too far, or he'll shut right down. He hates being told what to do. He isn't one of those closet subs who longs for a harsh word, pretty though that picture might be." Meg tightens the cuff around Ruby's wrists, loops the scarf over the bedpost, circles around to the other side. "Tell him what to do, and he'll walk right out the door."_

"Yes way," Ruby says. This isn't the first time they've gotten hot and bothered. But this will be the first time she does it with only the intention of getting to know him more intimately. It feels... well, _girlishly_ innocent. Clean. She isn't trying to get his trust or compliance, or convince him of anything, and she's sure he'll be jonesing for a fix afterward, because that's how this always ends, but it'll be different this time. She can feel it.

"Dean-"

"Dean's not here," she says. "You can do whatever you want, Sam. You don't have to obey him."

"_And he's pathetically human, beautifully so. He's got all these sad little thoughts, and sometimes he knows for sure that he'll never get what he really wants, and he's just a well of hopelessness with a smile plastered over the front." Meg slides the knife over Ruby's belly, a shallow cut that sends a thrill through Ruby's core. Meg leans over the cut, tastes it, looks up with that dark hair falling in cool waves over Ruby's prickling skin. "And the sad thing is? He's right, and he'll never give up the thing that stands in his way, never ever, never for good."_

"Ruby," Sam says, but cuts himself off when she seats herself across his hips, finds him thick and ready in spite of himself. He breathes through his teeth.

"Sam." She blinks; the smile vanishes. She moves and he hisses; she breathes out slowly and feels him beneath her. She leans in. "This is _for_ Dean, Sam. You are doing so much good. He can't understand it, but it _is_ for him."

His breath catches.

"_But really he's not that complicated, if you just remember those three things." Meg crawls up Ruby's body. Ruby can't defend herself, and she doesn't _trust _Meg, that would be stupid. But she thinks their alliance still holds, and she knows Meg gets something out of these trysts. Ruby balls her hands up in fists and pulls against the cuffs holding her back, mostly for show. Meg likes a show._

_Meg holds eye contact, dark lined like Ruby's own; not for the first time, Ruby wonders if she's kept this body because she found she liked Ruby's. Or perhaps she just enjoys dominating from the vantage point of the stereotypically weak. Her tongue finds Ruby's. Ruby tastes her own blood on it, tang and smoke and sulphur. Ruby imagines herself as Sam, this is what Sam would be tasting, imagines herself growing strong because of it. She's wearing the crown, she is the Throne of Lucifer._

_Meg grins at her, rakes her fingertip through the shallow cut across Ruby's stomach and brings the bloody thing to Ruby's lips, and while Ruby is rolling the taste of herself over her tongue, Meg is laughing and moving down Ruby's body again, and she invades Ruby, tongue and fingers without mercy, and Ruby throws her head back in ecstasy. _

"Ruby?"

Ruby looks down at Sam, at her King. He's just a boy, a boy with lusts and hopeless dreams he knows will never come true, a boy who's already broken. His brother is back, but she sees the way Dean looks at him, like he's a creature, like he wasn't worth giving his soul for, and that makes her want to burn cities in rage. After what Dean did in Hell - of course he was giving in to _her_ torments, but so is Sam, and Sam's are worse, because they're promises that he could be doing _good_ with the terrible thing inside him, where Dean just wanted to get back to Sammy. Dean's words enrage her, and then she sees what they do to Sam, and she's enraged again.

He's just a boy, a King, a Throne. He's a savior and a wonder, because he just keeps going even with the way Dean looks at him, even with those hopeless things in his head.

"Ruby?" he says again, and she blinks, smiles. He reaches up a finger to catch a tear that has slipped from her eye. "What-"

"Sorry." She leans back on him, maybe-not-so-accidentally grinding against his dick, but she laughs.

"What's wrong?"

Voice so soft, ah her King, oh her King. She smiles, she feels tears coming in spite of herself. "Nothing. I just."

He breathes out through his nose, frustrated. She knows now, he's starting to care for her, but he also can't ignore that she's a demon. Demons have killed everyone he's loved. A demon's pets dragged Dean to Hell. A demon gleefully took his father without even time for a goodbye. But at the same time, he can't stand to see her tearing up, and so she laughs, laughs it away. Her time is coming. She stops him from rolling out from under her, stops him with her hands on his chest, peels up his tee shirt, unbuckles his belt.

"Ruby-"

"Sam," she purrs.

He sighs, settles back under her. His eyes are hooded with that complicated lust, that tangled frustration.

"_But if you want to know what it felt like when I was inside him," Meg says, dragging cries from Ruby, pulling sobs from her as Ruby strains against the bonds. She gives Ruby a break long enough for Ruby to nod yes. "It was bliss, and it seared me to the core. A bright delicious agony, maybe something like this," she murmurs, and under her hands Ruby arches - again, again without a break, that's every time with Meg. Meg leans up as Ruby pants and half begs with every breath for Meg to stop or to go on or to let her finish one final time let this be the last time if she had a beating heart she's sure it would have burst by now - Meg leans up to Ruby's ear and says, "But better. It was _pure."

As she rocks down onto him, and he arches beneath her, giant hands around her waist, as she feels him thick inside her, letting go as he's probably never felt like he could before, she thinks, _oh no. Oh no. _She thought she was starting to fall for him, and that was okay, because she thought she knew what that entailed. But beneath her he's freer than he's ever been and he is _pure_ and she wants only the best for him and damn herself, and now she thinks:

_I love him. I love him. I love him._

And even if she lives to see Lucifer rise, she isn't going to survive this.


End file.
